Hungary has an ancient underground forest by Corina Ciubotaru

You'd never guess what some people can find in a coal mine. Apart from workers sweating away extracting, one who looks closely enough may stumble upon trees and even people. In Hungary, an entire underground forest has been found, consisting of 16 trees six meters tall, which date back 8 million years ago. It seems they were covered by sand during a sandstorm and that they probably had a much bigger height, but the canopy was destroyed over time. The trees are a type of cypress that grew in the marshes surrounding Lake Pannon in the Miocene period and are estimated to have taken three to four hundred years to reach the height at which they died. Scientists will now have loads of study material as the trees are very well preserved and have even remained brown on the inside, but they prove hard to move. The ancient trees are now brittle and they need to be protected from the sunlight and even from air. Only scientists and journalists are allowed to visit the site, 60 meters below ground and preservation efforts are being made, despite the large costs. Another forest like this has previously been found in Japan, where the trees have already been covered in a concrete case for preservation purposes. And while some miners found ancient trees near Bukkabrany, some other folks in Hungary have discovered a man's body in a lake from a mine, near Székesfehárvár. Unfortunately, not much can be said about him right now, as he is in very bad shape.

related story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6942733.stm

by Corina Ciubotaru for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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